Friday, November 04, 2011

Practicing What I Preach

This morning I had a good reminder that sometimes even professional organizers need to remember to practice what they preach. None of us are immune to needing simple organizing solutions to keep our lives and our spaces under control.

I was re-reading one of our previous newsletters, in which we were singing the praises of the backwards hanger trick for weeding out your closet:

Hang all of the clothes in your closet the "wrong" way, so that you are hooking the hangers from the back of the rod. If you wear it, hang the item back up the right way. Anything still left on a backwards hanger at the end of the season should be donated or consigned.

As I was trying to find something to wear this morning, I suddenly realized that I could use a good dose of the backwards hanger trick myself. My closet is definitely not over-stuffed - in fact, I need to do some strategic shopping in the near future. But just because it's not over-stuffed doesn't mean it's not cluttered with items I'm not using and should probably be donated. You see, my wardrobe is in a state of flux...last year at this time, I was pregnant, which as you moms out there know, sets in motion some major and often permanent changes in your clothing size and style. Now that I'm a no-longer-pregnant, but not-quite-back-to-my-previous-size-or-shape, new mom, my closet is filled with not-so-useful remnants of my pre-baby life.

So I did it - in less than 5 minutes, I turned around all of the hangers and will be dutifully donating any of the pre-baby clothes that just don't fit my new life. And that's okay with me. I will give it a month and do a review, weeding out the obvious and leaving a few "maybes" that could make an appearance for holiday festivities.

Bottom Line: Life changes, and as it does, so do our stuff and space needs. This is a perfect example of why organizing isn't a one-time thing. We need to learn the skills to keep up with our stuff and space as life evolves. Take a look around at your stuff - is there anything that's not in sync with your life today?

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